


First, Second, Third

by KareliaSweet



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Drabble, F/M, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-16
Updated: 2015-09-16
Packaged: 2018-04-21 03:29:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 775
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4813280
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KareliaSweet/pseuds/KareliaSweet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She thinks of what it would be like to kiss him, really kiss him, a proper kiss that isn't about the hearts of ancient spaceships or possession by a frisky skin-flap.</p>
            </blockquote>





	First, Second, Third

They've just returned from a trip to a world where the only form of food is ice cream. They'd spent a day eating every kind of flavor they could think of; first blackberry, then caramel, then pistachio fudge, all delicious but a little too normal for his tastes. So they'd worked their way up to stranger tastes; rose petal (which they'd both giggled at), tandoori chicken (never again) and, finally, almost unbelievably, chips. That one was for her sake, she knew, to add to the list of remarkably strange incarnations of chips she's eaten with him, although this was the first time she'd eaten them with... him, and the whole day there'd been that grin on his face, the one she's still, if she's honest, a little scared of.

She thinks of what it would be like to kiss him, really kiss him, a proper kiss that isn't about the hearts of ancient spaceships or possession by a frisky skin-flap. A real kiss that's clumsy and needy where you're not quite sure where to put your hands and is it all right if my mouth does this and sorry I didn't mean to hit your nose there. The first kisses, all fumbles and nerves and friction in places that hadn't touched like that before, were never the best kisses, but they were the first marks of passion that left indelible impressions on all the kisses to follow. The first time she had kissed Mickey he had accidentally bitten her bottom lip, hard. So hard it had been swollen for a week, and she didn't kiss him again for a month after that.

She has a feeling of what the first kiss with the Doctor would be like. Chaste, firm, but hinting. Hinting the way his eyes sometimes do, with flashes of thunder behind.

She thinks of what the second kiss would be like, whether that hint would to blossom into a definite something. Whether accompanying lightning would strike. Would his hands move to her hair, her hips? Or - and she tries and fails to imagine this without blushing - lower? Would they grasp and grope in a rush and then suddenly part, realizing this was too fast, too soon and they had to slow down, had to stop.

She knows that with the third kiss, they wouldn't be able to stop.

He looks at her then, with eyes that she had first thought to be so new, but behind them, just behind, she can see how much he has seen, how much she will never see.

She realizes it at that moment, seeing those old, old eyes, realizes it with deep and bitter resignation. She will never, ever kiss him. And it's not that she doesn't want to, she's actually pretty sure that he'd want to as well, if she asked. But she knows that for him, a kiss would last, if he was lucky, one second. But for her, that one second would stretch on past all the years of her life. There would be no time for the second, or the third, because by then he would be alone. And for all the kisses in the world, she knows she can't do that to him. She knows that, probably, she could do it to herself, because the truth is she loves him just a bit more than she loves herself, and she knows it isn't healthy but she just can't help it. And, really, in the scheme of things, traveling through time and space across the universe with a man who could change his face, not exactly the healthiest of relationships to begin with.

"Right," he says, left foot placed precariously on the console as he tugs at yet another lever, "more chips? Or...", he runs a tongue across his teeth, that grin sliding into place again, "Austen?

She thinks on this for a moment, trying to place it.

"You mean, in Texas?"

"Nahhh," he scoffs, "not Texas, that's rubbish! At least, until 2349, but who'd want to go then anyway? Terrible year. Welll, except for that one Tuesday... but that was definitely a fluke. No, I meant Austen. As in, Jane. Fancy meeting her?"

"Really?"

"Why not? We've done Dickens, let's see if we can meet a literary genius without any ghosts, eh?"

She laughs at that, and he does too, and the smile they share says more than any kiss ever would.

"Austen it is."

"Brilliant!" He toggles with a few more buttons, reaches over to her and grabs her hand. She laces her fingers with his, closes her eyes. He pulls her a fraction closer.

"Hold on tight!"

And she does.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this aeons ago, but since I've set up a place to house my ramblings I thought I'd put it here for posterity. The only Whofic I ever wrote and a silly piece, written during Season 4 (yes it's that old).


End file.
